Keywords
teacher training, elementary, writing, holistic scoring, teacher efficacy
Abstract
This study evaluated the effectiveness of a school-based training that attempted to improve the reliability of holistic scores teachers assigned to the writings of elementary school students. Seventeen teachers at one suburban elementary school located in the Southeastern United States participated in three training sessions that allowed for scoring practice and group discussions. The trainers, or presenters, were "faculty-experts." A comparison of scores the participants assigned to students' writings before and after the training was conducted. The analyses included t-tests that compared the participants' mean scores to the scores assigned by raters from the state, a within-group analysis of reliability as measured by Cronbach's Alpha, and percentage agreement analyses. The results suggested that the in-house training activities promoted higher inter-rater reliability of scores assigned to students' writings by the teachers in this study. This study also compared teachers identified as being highly confident writers with teachers who reported low levels of self-confidence related to writing. Prior to the training, the highly confident teachers' scores tended to be lower than the state scores and the scores assigned by their less confident peers. During group discussions, however, the "high-confidence" group was just as likely to change their scores to a higher level as to a lower level, and by the end of the training, both groups demonstrated more consistent score patterns.
Notes
If this is your thesis or dissertation, and want to learn how to access it or for more information about readership statistics, contact us at STARS@ucf.edu
Graduation Date
2008
Advisor
Hynes, Michael
Degree
Doctor of Education (Ed.D.)
College
College of Education
Department
Teaching and Learning Principles
Degree Program
Curriculum and Instruction
Format
application/pdf
Identifier
CFE0002297
URL
http://purl.fcla.edu/fcla/etd/CFE0002297
Language
English
Release Date
September 2008
Length of Campus-only Access
None
Access Status
Doctoral Dissertation (Open Access)
STARS Citation
Farmer, Lisa, "A Study Of An Attempt To Improve The Reliability Of Teachers' Holistic Scores Of Elementary Writing Through In-house Profess" (2008). Electronic Theses and Dissertations. 3538.
https://stars.library.ucf.edu/etd/3538